Fix It and keep it

At around sixty thousand miles I had to change the timing belt on my 1995 Toyota Corolla. Nothing went wrong with the old belt it was just time to change it based on the recommendations in the owners manual. The first thing that I did was prepare to do the work by going to Toyota and getting original equipment manufacturer replacements. I got a new timing belt and a new idler/tensioner pulley.

In preparing the car to do the work I jacked up the front and of the car around ten inches and put jack stands underneath for support. Then I removed the right front tire and the plastic shroud between the tire and the engine. Removing the shroud allowed me to access the lower pulley and remove it. I was also able to loosen the alternator belt through the opening.

To the left of the timing belt cover is a motor mount that had to be detached to allow space to slide off the old timing belt and slide on the new one. To prepare the motor mount I put a floor jack with a block of wood on top of the lift place under the oil pan and brought the jack right up to the pan. Then I loosened the motor mount and raised the floor jack around one inch, that allowed enough room to slide the old belt off and slide the new one on.

Before putting on the new timing belt I replaced the idle/tensioner pulley with the new one and then installed the new belt keeping the alignment of the sprockets in check.

When reinstalling the plastic cover over the lower sprocket, the one right behind the harmonic balancer pulley, be careful that it seats correctly, it fits in an irregular pattern and can appear to be seated fully, but really be sticking out to where it will rub on the harmonic balancer when the engine is running and wear a hole in the plastic cover exposing the timing belt to the elements.

Reassemble everything in reverse order and it should be good to go. Once the engine has warmed up it will be a good idea to check the valve clearances, I had found a couple the were out of tolerance on my Corolla.

Bob Crane is the author of http://www.americanwrenches.com - a site that helps many find tools they need for their projects.